Taken with K700

It's so cute that I'm tempted to bring home some that day. It's not even wider than my finger. It may not be printable on my printer. It costs more than 1/2 of the A4 version yet looks like 1/10 the size of A4. It even comes in colour. This may come in handy if I have a 1:30 doll house that comes with a very very small printer.

Tagged: singapore cute

Combination of 3 images, no prizes for guessing the age. There's peach, grapes, strawberries, lemon and kiwi on this cake. Did you spot them all here?

Forgot my wide angle lense (how could I!), so the next best thing would be to take a couple of photos then stitch them together. Found this free auto stitching software that will do it effortlessly and even rotate the image a bit to make them fit. Looks quite cool except for some black areas around the image.

Tagged: singapore cake dsc h1 panoramic

Taken with the panoramic function of my K700, one of the most common handphone in Singapore today.

This kopitiam located at one of the oldest housing estates in Singapore includes only 1 stall selling wanton noodles and a drinks seller. According to my Dad, he used to bring my sister here more than 25 years ago for their breakfast. They are still using the traditional folding tables and plastic chairs and the atmosphere there really brings you back 20 years or more. Perhaps the only modern tell tale signs will be the ribena packets at the right side of the photo.


Tagged: singapore kopitiam k700

Would you pay $10/hr to play beach volleyball at the heartlands? Or $80 for a day's access? It seems that somebody did book the place for the next few evenings. Maybe I should keep a look out for it.

Tagged: singapore clementi beach volleyball

How many sides do a die have? 6 sided just like the one above? Now I had seen 3 sided and 8 sided dice when I was just a boy but today, I got to see more than that. Look at all these regular and fair dice I've got.


The 4 sided die, you read off the value from the base of the die.


The 8 sided die with triangles as the face of the die.


This is actually a 10 sided die. The value starts from 0. Perfect for choosing 4D numbers. Each face seems to be a quadrilateral.


A 12-sided die with pentagon as the face.


The mother of them all, a 20 sided triangle face die.


Comes in green too

All these dice are for one game, it's call maths warrior. It's a 2 players game where the objective is to "kill" all your opponent's dice by using Math and luck. Basically, players take turns to attack and of course there's maths involved. Want to get a set for yourself? Contact me lar... Think it costs about $12 for a set of 12 die above with instructions etc...


Tagged: singapore games math dice dsc h1

Omigod!! Konica is withdrawing from camera and photo business!! Wonder if that will affect the 20 cents per digital 4R prints I enjoy now at Konica given their announcement.

For color film and color paper, while considering our customer needs, we will step-by-step reduce product lineup and cease our color film and color paper production by the end of fiscal year ending March 31, 2007.

Under this agreement, on March 31 2006, Sony will receive certain assets from Konica Minolta PI that are necessary for the development, design, production and so forth of digital SLR cameras compatible with Konica Minolta PI’s “Maxxum/Dynax lens mount system”.** Sony will accelerate development of new digital SLR cameras based on and compatible with the Maxxum/Dynax lens mount system with a view to marketing these models this summer.

Konica Minolta has superb autofocus auto-exposure technologies nourished through development of “Maxxum/Dynax series” from the age of film cameras, mechanical electronics technologies indispensable for SLR cameras, and sixteen million units of lens shipped worldwide.

We got a pretty witty lecturer for Physics this semester as he shares some of his "words of wisdom" with us in class. This one is way overdue but heck, bet most of ya never heard of it before. This one is about the moral issues on marking assignments/tests.

There are 3 ways to grade all the tests scripts.

You can go with the impressionist approach to take one look at the paper and determine the grade.

OR

You can go with the statistics approach by giving grades randomly following a bell curve

OR

You can take the rhythmic approach to set 2 easy questions and 2 difficult, so you go "tick tick cross cross" in marking.

Classes at NIE just barely started for me and I'm almost standing at the midpoint of this short semester. This is the middle of the 3rd week of a six week semester and I have like so many assignments to do (again) before the semester ends. For all those aspiring teachers to be still in university, enjoy the relatively slow paced undergraduate life you have now before you step into NIE. You will know what I mean when all your grades depend only on your continuous assessment. Look at this...

Module A: 4 essays (500 words so must be concise, yet need to do read up and referencing so cannot anyhow say) and a 70minutes tutorial presentation cum discussion in group work (lesson plan included).

Module B: In class group work twice weekly with homework assignments, 50%, writeup cum individual presentation 50%

Module C: Lesson plan (5%), Microteaching (35%), Reflection (10%), Assignment 1 (5%), Assignment 2a, 2b (15%), Assignment 3 (10%), Assignment 4 (10%)

Physics Module: Choice of essay, writing exam paper, critique an exam paper (100%).

That's like 4^2=16 things to work on in 6 weeks (About 3 each week). Makes me feel like a secondary school kid with 8 subjects under my name again. Thanks goodness I'm a physics graduate...


Tagged: singapore nie

I must admit I'm having lots of fun with this (DSC H1) versatile camera, taking lots of photos I never thought of taking before. Sony may had screw up in the music front but they sure make some nice cameras though. There are many "experts" around who look down on Sony as a camera brand, just like some "drivers" who do likewise to Korean cars. Don't be fooled by these "experts" as they may not had taken any decent photos themselves. I have read more than my fair share of baseless comments against Sony cameras in Singapore and it's time to straighten the facts now.

Myth 1: Sony is a new-comer in cameras and can't be compared to old horses like Canon and Nikon in terms of quality.
Fact 1: The first consumer digital camera (as we know it) was born in 1994, Sony sold their first cybershot (DSC F1) in 1996. So Sony had 10 years of experience in digital photography. In addition, Sony cameras nowadays uses Zeiss lens and in Sony cameras are doing as well as Canon in lab tests. (At least for my H1, which incidentally is a Sony made lens)

Myth 2: Sony cameras are over-priced.
Fact 2: The Canon Powershot S2 IS list price S$949 (23/6/05) vs Sony H1 list price S$899 (18/7/05). This is just an example that Sony cameras are competitively priced. Not forgetting the Sony H1 comes with more accessories than Canon S2 IS. This comparison is fair because both cameras are 12X 5mp cameras with similar specs competing for the same market.

Myth 3: CF/SD is better than Sony memory stick because it is cheaper and more versatile.
Fact 3: Comparing Sandisk 1gb price for standard memory cards, SD (USD 99.99), MS Pro (USD 89.99), CF (USD 99.99). The memory stick came out cheaper! Of course, I have to say that the MS is more expensive for 512mb and below but cheaper for 1gb and higher but this is sufficient to dispel the myth.
Fact 4: CF/SD cards are more common among several brands of cameras while the MS is mainly used by Sony, but MS could be use with other products such as PSP. They are versatile in their own ways.


Tagged: singapore digital camera dsc h1